


The Boy on the Milk Carton

by Jmeelee



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Beacon Hills High School, Kidnapping, M/M, Sterek Week 2017, The Face on the Milk Carton AU, sterekscenestealer3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-23 10:24:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12505260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jmeelee/pseuds/Jmeelee
Summary: “That’s me on there,” Stiles whispered.  His voice sounded flat, like someone had ironed it.  His head was pounding.  Could it be the milk allergy doing this to him, making him hallucinate?  Was he going insane?  Surely it took years to descend to the level of crazy where you fantasized your tiny self onto the side of a milk carton.Stiles imagined what people would say when they realized he had gone insane.  He envisioned his father or perhaps Deputy Parrish interviewing Scott or Lydia.  “On Tuesday Stiles lost points on his English essay,” they would tell the officer, who would scribble notes into his trusty notepad.  “Then on Wednesday he lost his mind!”





	The Boy on the Milk Carton

**Author's Note:**

> For Sterek Week 2017- Day 2: Scene Stealer.
> 
> I've been toying with writing a Sterek fic for one of my fav YA novels of all time, _The Face on the Milk Carton_ by Caroline B. Cooney. If there is any interest in seeing more, I might come back to it. But for now, here is how I envision the story starting!

Stiles had twenty-seven minutes to finish his English essay. He never knew what grade he would get in Ms. Blake’s English class. Whenever she wanted a light hearted assignment, Stiles went serious. Whenever she wanted serious, Stiles wrote a thousand words on the history of male circumcision. 

It was October. Outdoors throbbed with autumn. The last place Stiles wanted to be was inside the walls of Beacon Hills High School. He wanted to jump into his blue jeep and drive for miles, taking any road at all.

He was half watching the yellow and red leaves wretch free from their twigs and whirl in the wind, and the other half of him was listening in on his friends conversations at the lunch table, so his essay writing was not going well. ADHD was a pain in the ass.

He put down his pen and picked up his peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He chewed quickly, then reached for his can of red sugar water that was labeled ‘cranberry juice cocktail.’ He’d recently been diagnosed as lactose intolerant, which was a fancy way of saying he got severe cramps and wanted to barf after drinking milk or eating ice cream. Today sucked; peanut butter and jelly sandwiches _required_ milk. He eyed his best friend Scott’s tiny milk carton with envy, as Scott lifted it to his mouth and drained it in three gulps.

Scott smacked his lips, then turned over the milk carton in his hand. “Okay,” he said to the table, “let’s see who’s been kidnapped this time.” Scott sounded weary, as if jaded from the vast number of kidnappings in the world.

“Who cares?” Jackson sneered. “Half the time those pictures are either too grainy to make out, or they’re over a decade old. It's ridiculous; no one will ever recognize these kids. Plus, they’re probably dead.”

Stiles had been eating lunch since the school year began with Scott, Isaac, Lydia, Erica and Boyd. Jackson was Lydia’s jerk boyfriend, and much to Stiles’ dismay, they came as a matched set to every social function.

Stiles sipped from his can of juice, and pretended it was milk. Across the cafeteria, Derek Hale waved to him. Derek was his next door neighbor. He was a senior, and never did any homework. The academic office was threatening Derek with summer school and withholding his diploma if he didn't shape up. Stiles knew this because Derek had two sisters, Laura, the older sister, and Cora, the younger, who were both model students. Derek was constantly being compared to them by teachers and his own parents. His sister, Laura, was a law school student at Stanford, and came home weekends just to remind Derek that he was a slacker. Derek would often stomp out of his loud, boisterous house and come over to eat dinner with Stiles and his father.

“You’re here so often I should charge you a meal fee,” Stiles’ dad had joked just last night.

Derek’s weirdly small ears turned red. “I’m sorry, Sheriff Stilinski. I can go home.”

“Nonsense, son.” John Stilinski jabbed Derek playfully in the side, the way, if it had been Stiles, he would have hugged. “You’re welcome in our home anytime. Here, have a brownie and finish all the ice cream. Stiles can’t eat it anymore. It will make him poop his pants.”

“Dad!” Stiles had squeaked, but the dejected expression had melted off Derek’s face with his laughter, so Stiles was secretly willing to withstand a bit of mortification. Derek had the _best_ smile. 

“I hate to say it, but he has a point,” Erica leans over to whisper out of the side of her red-painted mouth at him, firmly pulling him back into the kidnapped children conversation. “I don’t know how you’re supposed to recognize someone who was kidnapped from a zoo in San Diego when they were three.”

Stiles waved back at Derek, and studiously ignored the butterflies flapping their wings against his ribcage. Looking at Derek, thinking about Derek, always made him feel heavy, like the difference between whole milk and skim. But he didn't have time to get all moony over the boy next door right now. He could do that later, in the privacy of his own bedroom while his dad worked the night shift at the precinct. Right now he needed to finish this English essay.

With one last look at the dust specks dancing in the golden light streaming through the windows, Stiles picked his pen back up and once again set it to paper. 

“My mother says none of them are really kidnapped, anyway.” It took Stiles a moment to realize Scott was talking to him about the milk carton kids again. He paused his pen mid-sentence, and took another bite of his sandwich. 

“What do you mean?” Stiles asked with a mouth full of sticky peanut butter. His mouth started to water at the thought of cool, sweet milk to wash down his lunch. 

“All it is,” Lydia answered firmly, “is divorce. One parent takes the kid and doesn’t tell the other where they’re going. None of these kids were actually kidnapped like you see in a Lifetime Movie special.”

How many cartons of milk, Stiles wondered, would it take to kill someone with lactose intolerance?

“You mean none of these kids were stolen?” Isaac inquired. He sounded vaguely disappointed. “No ransom demands? No one is being tortured in a dingy basement?”

While Isaac was lamenting the pathetic state of kidnappings, Stiles reached forward and snatched the carton of two percent milk off his tray, and drank it up.

The perfect meal: peanut butter and jelly sandwich with milk. Stiles set the carton down and sighed with pleasure.

The little boy on the back of the carton stared up at him.

Like Jackson had said, the picture wasn't much to look at. After all, how good could it be when it was shrunk down and printed on recycled cardboard?

“Is everyone ready for the science test?” Lydia asked the table.

“Ugh. I was until I ate cafeteria food,” Erica complained. “I might end up in the nurse's office with food poisoning. Think Mr. Harris will accept that excuse?”

“Not likely,” Boyd laughed. 

The child on the milk carton was an ordinary little boy. He had chubby cheeks, and a cute comb-over hair style. In the picture, he was wearing a dark collared shirt with light polka dots. 

Something evil and thick settled on Stiles, blocking his throat and dimming his eyes. He hasn't had a panic attack since his mother had passed away eight years ago, but he was terrified he was having one right now in the middle of the high school cafeteria. 

“Scott,” he said. He could hear himself screaming Scott’s name, but his lips weren't moving. He was making no sound at all. 

He reached toward the sleeve of Scott’s lacrosse uniform, but his hand wouldn’t obey. It rested motionless on top of the milk carton. Was it Stiles’ hand? He could barely recognize it. 

“You drank my milk!” Isaac complained loudly. “Dick move, Stiles.”

“Aw man, why did you do that?” Scott asked. “You know it's just going to make you sick!”

“That’s me on there,” Stiles whispered. His voice sounded flat, like someone had ironed it. His head was pounding. Could it be the milk allergy doing this to him, making him hallucinate? Was he going insane? Surely it took years to descend to the level of crazy where you fantasized your tiny self onto the side of a milk carton. 

Stiles imagined what people would say when they realized he had gone insane. He envisioned his father or perhaps Deputy Parrish interviewing Scott or Lydia. “On Tuesday Stiles lost points on his English essay,” they would tell the officer, who would scribble notes into his trusty notepad. “Then on Wednesday he lost his mind!”

“Stiles,” Erica sighed, “if Harris won't believe I have food poisoning, then he definitely won't believe you were kidnapped. Good luck with that.”

He remembered that shirt. He remembered the whole outfit he was wearing. The little dress shirt was made of light summer material, and the wind had blown right through it when he was on the swings at the park. The collar had itched his neck.

“You’re just trying to get out of writing that dumb English essay,” Lydia laughed. She tilted the carton toward her, and read the information. “So Stiles, if you were kidnapped from a zoo in San Diego a dozen years ago, what are you doing here now?”

His mind spun like a color wheel. When it slowed down he could separate the primary facts. He had a father, who was the town Sheriff. He’d had a mother, until she had passed away eight years ago. He had a whole childhood of memories with his family. But then the wheel would speed up and the facts would blur dizzily. That was _him_. That was _his_ picture on the side of the milk carton.

The bell rang, and everyone but Stiles stood from the table. They tossed their lunch trays toward the large rolling garbage bins, but half of them missed. They all ducked under the plump arms of the lunch monitors and raced to class instead of picking up their mess. He was dimly aware of Derek, hovering at the doorway of the cafeteria, watching him with furrowed eyebrows.

Stiles sat there, unmoving, clutching the empty milk carton, and staring into his own three-year-old face.

_I was kidnapped._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. Come yell about Sterek with me on [tumblr!](http://jmeelee.tumblr.com/)
> 
> EDIT: Due to a comment I received, I just want to make it totally clear that this fic was written for the prompt "scene stealer" and closely follows the first chapter of _The Face on the Milk Carton_. My intention was not to plagiarize, but to steal the scene and make it sterek, as the prompt required. That being said, everyone should go read the book! Its YA and it's pretty old at this point, BUT it stands the test of time and is amazing. Hence why I chose to steal the scene :-) **IF** I were to continue this story, it would veer wildly away from the book. Just wanted to make that clear :-)


End file.
